Recently, wind turbines have received increased attention as environmentally safe and relatively inexpensive alternative energy sources. With this growing interest, considerable efforts have been made to develop wind turbines that are reliable and efficient.
Generally, a wind turbine includes a rotor having multiple blades. The rotor is mounted to a housing or nacelle, which is positioned on top of a truss or tubular tower. Utility grade wind turbines (i.e., wind turbines designed to provide electrical power to a utility grid) can have large rotors (e.g., 30 or more meters in length). In addition, the wind turbines are typically mounted on towers that are at least 60 meters in height. Blades on these rotors transform wind energy into a rotational torque or force that drives one or more generators. As the blades are rotated by the wind, noise is inherently generated.
International standards exist to measure noise level produced by wind turbines. The existing system and standards measure an overall noise level produced by the wind turbine, typically from a fixed point. This overall noise level is utilized to configure the wind turbine with noise reduction equipment. Configuring of wind turbine blades for noise levels requires long and costly steps including outfitting of the blades, evaluating the blade set over a testing period wherein the process is then repeated for new blade arrangement. Such steps require multiple iterations, each iteration requires rigging of all of the blades. The rigging of these blades may require lifting equipment, personnel and time. Wind turbine blades and associated equipment may be large or heavy, requiring specialized equipment that is expensive to operate. Further, wind turbines may be installed on uneven terrain and/or on very high towers (e.g., towers that are at least 60 meters in height) that are inaccessible to mobile land-based cranes. The installation, servicing and configuration may be very expensive and time consuming.
What is needed is a method and system for configuring and/or analyzing wind turbine blade noise level that permits configuration of the wind turbine and provides individual blade noise levels for configuration and operation of the wind turbine, wherein the process does not require the expensive and labor-intensive processes of the known noise level measurement and configuration systems.